Poly(lactate-co-glycolate) (PLGA), which is a representative biodegradable polymer derived from lactate and glycolate, is a polymer having high applicability to a general purpose polymer or medical polymer. Currently, the PLGA may be prepared by a direct polymerization reaction of lactate and glycolate, but PLGA having a low molecular weight (1000 to 5000 daltons) is mainly prepared in this reaction. PLGA having a high molecular weight of 100,000 daltons or more may be synthesized by a ring opening condensation reaction of lactide and glycolide. The lactide and glycolide, which are cyclic diesters of lactate and glycolate, respectively, are formed by pyrolysis of a lactate oligomer and a glycolate oligomer, respectively.
In the ring opening condensation reaction, a catalyst such as tin(II) 2-ethylhexanoate, tin(II) alkoxide, aluminum isopropoxide, or the like, should be used. As a method of preparing the PLGA having a high molecular weight, there is a method of polymerizing a polymer having a relatively high molecular weight from a polymer obtained by direct polymerization and having a low molecular weight using a chain coupling agent, but in this method, since the chain coupling agent is used, a process may be complicated due to addition of an organic solvent or the chain coupling agent, and it may be difficult to remove this organic solvent or chain coupling agent.
Currently, in a commercialized process for producing the PLGA having a high molecular weight, a method of converting lactate and glycolate into lactide and glycolide, respectively, and then synthesizing the PLGA through the ring opening condensation reaction of the lactide and glycolide has been used.
Meanwhile, poly(hydroxyalkanoate) (PHA) is a polyester accumulated by microorganism as an energy or carbon source storage material in the microorganism when the carbon source excessively exists but other nutrients such as phosphorus, nitrogen, magnesium, oxygen, and the like are insufficient. Since the PHA has complete biodegradability while having physical properties similar to those of the existing synthetic polymers derived from petroleum, the PHA has been recognized as a material replacing the existing synthetic plastic material.
The existing known PHA may be representatively divided into a short-chain-length PHA (SCL-PHA) having a short carbon chain and a medium-chain-length PHA (MCL-PHA) having a long carbon chain. Gene for synthesizing the PHA was cloned from Ralstonia eutropha, Pseudomonas, or the like, and PHA composed of various monomers was synthesized by recombinant microorganism (Qi et al., FEMS Microbiol. Lett., 157:155, 1997; Qi et al., FEMS Microbiol. Lett., 167:89, 1998; Langenbach et al., FEMS Microbiol. Lett., 150:303, 1997; WO 01/55436; U.S. Pat. No. 6,143,952; WO 98/54329; WO 99/61624).
Since glycolic acid is the simplest hydrocarboxylic acid, there has been an attempt to insert glycolic acid into the PHA polymer using a PHA synthase enzyme of Ralstonia europha and a glycolyl-CoA produced from beta oxidation pathway as a substrate.
The present inventors confirmed that in the case of culturing recombinant E. coli transfected with propionate CoA-transferase gene (Pct) derived from Clostridium propionicum, which is gene coding an enzyme converting lactate and glycolate into lactyl-CoA and glycolyl-CoA, respectively, and poly(hydroxyalkanoate) (PHA) synthase gene using lactyl-CoA and glycolyl-CoA as substrates in a production medium containing glucose and glycolate or glucose, glycolate, and hydroxyalkanoate, poly(lactate-co-glycolate) and poly(lactate-co-glycolate-co-hydroxyalkanoate) were produced (Korean Patent Application No. 10-2009-0030133).
However, the method of producing PLGA using the recombinant E. coli has a disadvantage in that glucose and glycolate corresponding to precursors of the monomer should be individually added.
Therefore, the present inventors have tried to develop recombinant E. coli capable of producing PLGA in which a content of a glycolate fraction is high without adding exogenous glycolate, and confirmed that in the case of expressing glycerate dehydrogenase of P. multocida or E. coli in E. coli transfected with propionate CoA-transferase of Clostridium propionicum and PHA synthase of Pseudomonas sp. 6-19, deleting isocitrate lyase regulator gene (iclR) and aceB (malate synthase) gene, and amplifying isocitrate lyase gene (aced), even though glycolate is not added, PLGA in which the content of the glycolate fraction is high may be produced at a high concentration using only glucose, thereby completing the present invention.